Ivanov Court Refuses to Dispute Decision of the FSSD to Deport American Missionary

22 May 2009

On May 22, 2009, the Ivanov Regional Court
reviewed the claim made by American missionary Chris
Billek concerning the admittedly illegal decision
made with regards to the undesirability of his
residency in Russia. In spite of the fact that
neither the Department of the Federal Migration
Service nor the Federal Security Service Directorate
presented any evidence that Mr. Billek had broken
Russian legislation, the court refused to hear the
allegations listed in his claim. In other
words, the court did not view the actions of the
FSSD as illegal.

Sergey Burdachev, the
lawyer for the Coalition of Evangelical Christian
Baptist Churches in the Vladimir and Ivanov Regions,
reports that the representative of the FSSD in the
Ivanov Region did not explain in what way Chris had
broken Russian legislation, but rather in his
written response to Chris’ claim reported that
Chris’ “residency in Russian Territory represented a
POSSIBLE threat to the security of the Russian
Federation,” and that “the court HAD NO RIGHT to
interfere” in the authority and decisions of the
FSSD. “And this is supposedly the most humane
court in the world. The court goes its own
way, and the FSSD takes whatever actions it wants
and answers to no one. This is the reality of
life,” says Sergey Burdachev.

The court’s
decision can be appealed to the Russian Supreme
Court and to the European Court of Human Rights.
Vladimir Mis’kevich, the senior presbyter of the
Evangelical Christian Baptist Churches, has issued a
call to members: “Pray for Chris, for wisdom
in the resolution of this matter, and especially for
our safety. We are on the front lines.
We believe that God is for us and that Chris has
committed no crime.”